For a while on Thursday, New Zealand was surrounded by cloud but almost all land areas (including snow-capped mountains) enjoyed clear sunshine, as this image taken by a US satellite shows:

As the local MetService noted on Facebook, with the right south-westerly winds "New Zealand acts like a rock in a stream directing the wind and weather either side of country".

"With only small shifts in the flow direction the cloud can move closer or further away to the country," the service said.

Those small shifts seem to have taken hold, with rain and clouds returning on Friday, particularly to the South Island.